CHICAGO - OCTOBER 3: A disgruntled fan of the Chicago Cubs holds a sign saying "Dump Dusty," referring to Cubs manager Dusty Baker, during a game against the Atlanta Braves on October 3, 2004 at Wrigley Field in Chicago, Illinois. The Cubs defeated the Braves 10-8. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images) Ran on: 10-10-2004
Manager Dusty Baker took the heat for the Cubs' stretch-run collapse from broadcasters, fans and media alike. Ran on: 10-10-2004
Manager Dusty Baker took the heat for the Cubs' stretch-run collapse from broadcasters, fans and media alike. less

CHICAGO - OCTOBER 3: A disgruntled fan of the Chicago Cubs holds a sign saying "Dump Dusty," referring to Cubs manager Dusty Baker, during a game against the Atlanta Braves on October 3, 2004 at Wrigley Field ... more

In a world gone wrong, Dusty Baker's concern isn't just the St. Louis Cardinals or the National League wild card. It's enduring a tide of sentiment to run him out of town.

Chicago isn't the Bay Area, where Baker gets credit for years of contention, Felipe Alou is only mildly scolded for wearing out his bullpen, and Ken Macha survived an outright freefall that painted his team in distasteful colors. Nor is it the Bronx, where years of success allowed Joe Torre to sail through troubled waters. It's more like Boston, pre-2004, with its combination of curse logic and fans who treat the game as a life-and-death matter.

If anything captured the mood Baker now faces, it was Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS against the Yankees. Boston manager Grady Little stuck with his best pitcher, Pedro Martinez, through an inning that turned horribly sour. Since then, people all over baseball -- scouts, opposing managers, even such Red Sox mainstays as Jason Varitek -- have defended Little's judgment. But in Boston, somebody had to go down -- not gently, but in the manner of a public stoning. Somebody had to be ridiculed, humiliated and thrown into the street, and Little will forever (and wrongly) be remembered as the Blithering Idiot of '04.

Baker has become Chicago's village idiot. Never mind that he came within a Steve Bartman brain cramp of getting the Cubs to their first World Series since 1945. Forget the Sammy Sosa meltdown that brought down the franchise last year, or the cruel assortment of injuries that decimated this year's club. The Cubs aren't in first place. They aren't giving Chicagoans what they feel they deserve.

Without question, Baker must be partly accountable. He joined several of his players in a backlash against media criticism last year, when the team should have tactfully rallied against it. Some of his strategical moves have backfired. Just recently, he publicly decried the Wrigley Field booing of the Giants' LaTroy Hawkins and other visiting players, saying it might hurt the team's chances to sign free agents down the line.

Whatever you may feel about Dusty, the man is real, and one of the best managers in the game. Aside from the persistent rumors that he will ask out of Chicago before his contract expires (following the '06 season), there are disturbing reports that racism lurks behind the Windy City's ire.

Scoop Jackson, an African-American columnist for ESPN.com, made just such an accusation this week, targeting "certain members of the 312 area-code media who would like to see someone else at the helm." He went on to write, "If asked, Dusty would say I was wrong, that his being black has nothing to do with the rumors. If so, then I apologize. But in the words of the great racial philosopher Charles Barkley, 'I may be wrong -- but I doubt it.' " In the end, Jackson added, "the master plan will have worked, and once again, in the eyes of the local media, everything in Cubdom will be white -- I mean, right. "

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Jay Mariotti, the most strident of Baker's critics, felt compelled to announce, in print, that he's not a racist -- and truth be told, the extent of Chicago's desperation goes well beyond race. Mariotti co-hosted "Pardon the Interruption" this week with Michael Wilbon, the Chicago-raised black columnist of the Washington Post, and the two of them ripped Baker without mercy. "Chicago," said Mariotti, "is a city of equal- opportunity sports criticism."

As someone who has known and admired Baker for years, I hope he leaves Chicago early -- this winter, if the Cubs don't make the playoffs -- and with his dignity intact. He has seen enough of that town, and sadly, the feeling is mutual.

Where credit is due

Even if Macha doesn't get the contract extension he so richly deserves, he has to join the White Sox's Ozzie Guillen as the leading candidates for AL Manager of the Year ... The mark of a great team is to be impressive in defeat. The Twins had about two minutes to savor their 3-2 lead Wednesday night when Nick Swisher hammered a leadoff double in the eighth, setting up the A's tying run. On the Lew Ford hit that ended the game, Swisher made a strong, perfect relay throw to second baseman Mark Ellis, who caught the ball and unloaded it in one motion. That's winning stuff ... The A's are bound to lose six games out of eight, or some such thing, because that's the way of the game. No problem; the tone has been set. In the context of a four-game series, they're probably the most feared team in the league ... Dreadful overkill: Each night on the Giants' Fox Sports Net telecast, we get the "Barry Bonds home run history" with some blast from the past. What's the point, to torture everybody? Stop it, already ... This just in from Bonds, and listen closely, it's a two-parter: (a) "I'm done, finished, can't see ever playing again." (b) "It's not so bad, actually. See you Tuesday." ... Rafael Palmeiro's new legacy: When someone ends a sentence with an emphatic "Period," it actually means, "I'm lying."

It's hardly surprising that Bud Selig backed off a public news conference in the wake of the Palmeiro suspension. He couldn't face the questioning about an apparent leak from Major League Baseball (revealing the steroid in question to be Ben Johnson's favorite) or why it took two months to arrive at punishment. Give Selig some time, though. With federal backing, he'll get that 50-game suspension for first-time offenders, a quick appeal process that stifles the pathetic leaders of the players' union, and a policy that identifies every substance that shows up in a test ... Final tribute to Bay Area-raised Jerry Coleman, recently inducted into the broadcasters' wing of the Hall of Fame: In the opening game of the 1951 World Series against the Giants -- fresh off that Bobby Thomson home run -- the Yankees led off with Mickey Mantle in right field. Batting fourth in center field: Joe DiMaggio. Playing second base and batting seventh in that historic lineup: Jerry Coleman. Not a bad memory.